Wow.. I saw that awesome photo on my Flickr account about a year ago.. I thought Iwa Chin took that shot.. I didn't realize it until now that you did.. Awesome..

Thanks, but it's NOT my photo. I got it from a Google Image Search. There are hundreds just like it, and some that I shot too. I just don't have access to my old photos until my boxes arrive (The reach the Port of Bangkok today. I won't get them until the end of the week... if I'm lucky.

Drinking an afternoon iced tea and loving it!

EDIT: The photo that I said was shot from my widow is mine. The one of the release isn't.

Happy Canada Day, everyone! Celebrating here with a bit of Anniversary Breakfast Blend tea while I watch the Tour d' France that I recorded earlier on my TiVo. This is the third day on the island of Corsica, and it's really a beautiful island. Who'd have known? This is the first time the Tour has been to Corsica in the 100 Tours, and it's been a roaring success. And will have done the tourism industry on the island a world of good!

Good morning, all! Another beautiful sunrise... Seems to happen every day when your windows face east and your high up over the town. The Food lady gave me something really delicious this morning... I could recognize Thai eggplant and green beans, but there was some kind of minced meat in it. perhaps chicken, all in a tangy red curry sauce. I have to go back down and ask her the name of this one. A bit spicy, but really goooood! Along with a veggie omelet and a big mug of Ceylon tea, it was a nice way to start the day. Meeting with friends for lunch, a few chores to do, then it's a jam session tonight. The more I play this new guitar, the more I like it. It's got a very powerful mid-range to it, and the bass can be felt!

Time to start thinking about wheels... I got out of town yesterday in a mini-van, and it made me realize I was spending too much time in the center of town. I need to get out into the hills. I took some friends to see some ancient stone carvings of the Buddha that I knew of, and when walking, automatically fell back into my "keep an eye out for cobras" jungle walking mode. I guess it's like riding a bike. Not much call for it in Japan, but here, any time you are outside the city, it becomes a requirement.

If you are a TEA hound.. have you been to the Chiang Mia Tea House yet?.. Awesome place..

No, I haven't. It didn't exist when we last lived here, and I haven't stumbled across it as yet. Where is it located? The only thin I've seen so far, tea-related, is a little shop in the Galare Market off Changklan Rd, but that carries mostly greens and oolongs. I'm predominantly a black tea drinker. I did pick up some oolongs from the owner, but mostly to be diplomatic, not because they were wonderful brews. She worked so hard at having me sample half a dozen different teas I felt I needed to at least compensate her for her labors.

Enjoying an mid-afternoon mug of Ahmad's "English Breakfast" tea, and waiting for the electrician (or someone like him. )

Places DO burn down on every holiday here... But it doesn't seem to slow down the festivities. This is just ONE RELEASE in one city..... The releases go on steadily all night long in EVERY city. These balloons are called Kum Loy in Thai, and are released by people on EVERY holiday. but the biggest number are sent up on Loy Krathong, the Thai New Years.

We've just had a big fire here in the Midlands because of a Chinese Lantern... Caused a 6,000 foot smoke plume.

Sencha. It ha been a while and I do enjoy it. It helps that I actually ate well yesterday so didn't wake up feeling sluggish. And Lucas has been sleeping through the night for the last week so I am actually getting sleep.

Time for one more cuppa before I head off for tonight's jam session. A 'Ceylon High Mountain' is my choice. Although everyone else will be drinking beer, being the good boy that I am, I'll stick to club soda with a twist. My boxes should be here by the end of the week, and there's a wee bit of Bombay Sapphire that somehow got packed instead of given away. I can't figure out how that happened?!?

Two steepings of the Honyana Sencha and getting ready for a third. Finishing something at work then it is off for a quick walk. I am trying to get two fifteen minute walks in at work and time at the gym. Yesterday I hot 15,000 steps which made me happy. Loving my fitbit mainly because it is helping me focus on getting up and moving. It sounds silly but I think that many of us are so accustomed to sitting infront of a computer at work, that we forget to move. And then we get fat. I want to maintain my new healthy weight and that means consciously changing my own habits. If it takes a fitbit to track my movement, then so be it.

Ok...I finished a 100km run in Saromako Lake in Hokkaido on SUNDAY...a few hours later it was onsen"hotsprings' Sauna for an hour and 3 hours of drinking...I still feel like a square tire on a lopsided moped and I am now drinking cheap GIN on the rocks....Beefeater and have a blister the size of Sicily... guess I PICKed a bad week to quit drinking..

WHY? Running mainly to keep from getting Fat... me no like...on myself...Twas just a small hobby...but it has morphed to my main interaction with Japanese people who treat me as a Runner not as a "foreigner"... it is much harder to find a niche in Japan than say in Russia where I lived prior...Plus the insanity of the distance intrigues me. I did my first Marathon in Sasayama... a town about as old as Kyoto but much smaller.... 42.2 seemed like forever then..now it seems normal... half-marathons are easy now... not sure.. guess as I get older I would rather be ok at one thing then terrible and many...which I was in my youth...I'm still terrible at many things but I like to run and drink. The last 10k of my 100km I listened to an audiobook...helped me to forget the blisters I had been running on for two hours...